


Seeds of Life, Seeds of Death

by Tamoline



Category: Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: F/F, not graphic, some violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-14
Updated: 2017-09-14
Packaged: 2018-12-29 19:37:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12091989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tamoline/pseuds/Tamoline
Summary: Despite everything that’s changed, life in the Wasteland is still hard.





	Seeds of Life, Seeds of Death

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ideare](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ideare/gifts).



Despite everything that’s changed, life in the Wasteland is still hard…

 

* * *

 

 

“Surrender!” yells Furiosa, her words almost drowned out even to Toast next to her as they finally manage to corner the raiders that attacked the farms - the green farms - a few days ago.

 

Predictably, all that happens is some jeers and a small round object - a fire seed - arcing from the nearest of the vehicles. Toast twists the wheel of the wagon and the seed explodes harmlessly to one side, the acrid smell there then gone again. Even without looking, she can sense Furiosa cocking her pistol, then aiming it as Toast guns the engine. Both moving as parts in one glorious whole as Toast sideswipes one of the raider’s wagons, locking the vehicles together just long enough for Furiosa to unload three precious bullets into the other driver. One final tap by Toast - another wrenching sound of grinding metal - and the opposing vehicle is slewing and starting to roll even before it crashes into the wagon of another raider, great metal bodies crumpling into a heap.

 

It’s moments like this, in battle, when everything comes to life or death that Toast has found she truly lives for. When everything’s simple. When what she does truly matters. 

 

Whatever that says about her. Doubtless Splendid would have disapproved, would have thought that there had to have been a better way. 

 

But she’s dead and gone and there are people still living - more and more every day - that depend on the Citadel and the green farms that have started to surround it. And where there are people, there are always those who think that they can take what they have by force.

 

And so people like Furiosa, like Toast, that have to stop them. Planting seeds of death so that the seeds of life can flourish.

 

A lancer of the Citadel - Katar - prepares to throw a fire seed of their own into the broken mess, but Furiosa holds up a hand to stop them, then points in the direction of the raider vehicles still moving.

 

There’s always time to come back for any survivors later. They aren’t going anywhere.

 

And with a crump, Katar’s thrown fire seed consumes a still active raider’s bike.

 

* * *

 

 

It’s coming up to dusk - coming up to night, the time of rest for those not influential enough to have candles or lamps - when they finally eat, surrounded by the other protectors. Stew, made with actual vegetables grown in the green farms. Toast even spots a lucky lump of meat, doubtless scavenged from some Wasteland creature, in hers and chews on it appreciatively.

 

Furiosa rises to her feet gracefully, catches Toast’s eye and, with one hand, runs a hand through her hair. Toast understands the implicit message and, stomach knotting with a kind of suppressed excitement, gets to her feet as well and says goodbye to the others for the evening. Furiosa doesn’t say anything to Toast on the way through the stone corridors of the Citadel, and, as always, Toast follows her lead.

 

There are many things Toast that is willing to push, to disturb, to make her own way; this so far has not one of them.

 

They stop outside the threshold to Furiosa’s room, the hubbub form the common areas still susurrating gently around them, and Furiosa looks back at her. “My hair’s getting a little long,” she says, though they both know why they’re here already.

 

And just as she always does when this comes up, right from the first time, Toast says, almost insolently, “And I guess you want some help with that.”

 

Furiosa’s reactions are always slightly different. This time it’s with a slight edge of amusement. “If you wouldn’t mind.”

 

And Toast follows her into her chamber, her bed spread laid out against one wall, knives and other weapons spread out neatly on a table flush against the other.

 

And just like always, Furiosa sits down on the bed spread, and waits for Toast to wield the knife.

 

* * *

 

 

The raiders who didn’t manage to escape, either in one of their remaining vehicles, or to death, are lined up in the sand, some bruised, some bloodied, all battered. Protectors - some former warboys, some who just found it the best way they could serve the Citadel -  standing behind them to make sure no one tries anything.

 

Furiosa, fist of iron, a machete in her other hand as she stands before them, being the person the Citadel needs her to be. “Your band attacked the people of the Citadel, stole from them, killed some. The code of the Wasteland is simple - these acts means death,” she announces, eyeing them coldly.

 

Toast steps forward, forcing herself to try and to be the person Splendid would want her to be, however briefly. “But we are not the Wasteland. Your brothers and sisters have already paid the price of blood. We offer you now a choice. Walk away into the Wasteland as you are, never to return under pain of death. Pay the price of blood like your brethren, quick and merciful. Or join the people of the Citadel, to work for the common good, under probation.”

 

The first raider, an old man who must be in his late twenties, spits at her, a broken half decayed tooth bouncing off her cheek. “I know this trick,” he says. “Let us walk away, see how far we get before you hunt us down. Kill me now, like a man.”

 

Furiosa steps forward and, with one blow, obliges him.

 

* * *

 

 

Toast’s stomach twista with… with something she doesn’t quite want to put a name to, but that subsides as she picks up the straight razor and her hands shake not at all as she starts to cut Furiosa’s hair.

 

It’s something like what she imagines a religious experience must be, having Furiosa kneel before her like this, like a supplicant. Furiosa isn’t the type to even sit with her back to an open door willingly, but she trusts Toast with a knife to her back when she has none.

 

It’s nothing that Toast could have imagined when she first met Furiosa, the impassive, seemingly emotionless guard to their fate. Not even when Splendid managed to persuade her to take them to the Green Place. Splendid was the heart, the only one Furiosa really listened to.

 

But now she can’t imagine not being allowed snatches of time in this place, just her and Furiosa, these open moments that just they share.

 

And yet…

 

And yet…

 

And yet now Toast wants something more than this, something she can’t quite name. Maybe something akin to what Cheedo and the Dag have, though she can’t quite imagine Furiosa and her sharing anything as soft as what’s between those two.

 

She gently lays her empty hand on Furiosa’s shoulder, just for a second, feels it twitch beneath her touch, then relax, and she knows, she knows, she’s almost sure that Furiosa wants this too, but is waiting for Toast to make the first move.

 

And yet…

 

And yet…

 

And yet…

 

What she and Furiosa have already is so precious, she hasn’t been able to, can’t, bring herself to disturb it. And so, as she finishes trimming Furiosa’s hair, she leans forward to take something of Furiosa’s with her — her scent, that mix of cordite, grease, sweat and something indefinably other that is just Furiosa’s.

 

She can’t do anything else.

 

She can’t.

 

She can’t.

 

Job finished, she gets to her feet and says…

 

* * *

 

 

“Scral that,” says the fifth of the raiders they ask. She rips off the cloth swathing her head to reveal the scrawny face of a too thin teenage girl. “The honour of the Wasteland Way is great and all, but if you’re offering regular food and drink I’m happy to work in the dirt, or whatever else you want of me.”

 

The rest of the raiders — even the two who had already taken the option of exile — look at each other, and start talking, arguing, shouting at each other. One tries to get up and is brutally thrust into the ground for his troubles. 

 

But now that the first raider has broken ranks, others follow. In the end, ten agree to join the people of the Citadel, the humiliation of probation notwithstanding. Five take the option of exile, walking off with nothing but the clothes on their back and a knife each. Only the first two took the option of a quick death.

 

Toast can’t help smiling and even Furiosa doesn’t look quite as harsh as she might.

 

For all the blood that’s been spilt here today, it’s a better ending than she might have hoped for.

 

* * *

 

 

“Please,” Toast says before she can stop herself.

 

Furiosa looks up, hawklike, with that same almost telepathy they’ve grown to share, studying her face, just to make sure.

 

Toast stands firm, not able to repeat the word, not able to say anything else, but also not taking the word back.

 

Please, can we move forward.

 

Please, can we do… something.

 

Please.

 

“Are you sure?” Furiosa asks, as softly as she can.

 

Toast, feeling almost paralysed, but still refusing to walk it back, still can’t say anything, can’t even nod, but does manage to offer Furiosa her hand.

 

Here, take it.

 

Take it and rise.

 

Rise and join me.

 

And Furiosa does.

 

“Are you sure?” Furiosa asks again, towering over Toast, but so close that she can smell the stew still on Furiosa’s breath, mixing with her smell.

 

And Toast…

 

And Toast…

 

And Toast somehow manages to go up on tip toes, bringing her mouth closer to Furiosa’s. For a kiss, but, more importantly, that indefinable *something*.

 

The fear still twists in her stomach. This may ruin everything they have. But Toast can no longer tell herself that exploring it is something she wants to deny herself.

 

And as Furiosa’s mouth descends to meet hers, she dares to hope that maybe…

 

That maybe…

 

That maybe…

 

* * *

 

 

Despite everything that’s changed, life in the Wasteland is still hard, but now there is always hope as well.

 


End file.
